What's Next -- Leon Durham Pulls a Bartman from the First Row of the Stands?

Ooof.

I think Ron Santo's hairpiece jumped off his head and ran around the on-deck circle earlier tonight.

The Cubs just botched their way to giving up 5 runs in a Dodgers second-inning bat-around, with two ground balls hit directly to infielders -- one a potential double play -- kicked asunder. The Cubs are hurtling toward a two-game deficit at home... and somehow looking cosmically screwed in addition to simply inept. Cubs = TOOOAST!!!

Bummer.

In other NLDS news, the Phillies' Brett Myers started Game 2 against the Brewers horribly, conjuring memories of his last two regular-season starts in the first inning. But then he somehow found his mechanics and mowed down Los Cervecerios for the next 6 innings until he was lifted for a pinch-hitter in the eighth.

Myers is an unstable redneck, but he's our unstable redneck.

I was frankly expecting nothing -- or at least nothing good -- from Myers in the '08 playoffs, but with Cole Hamels throwing eight dominant innings in Game 1 and Myers following it up with tonight's performance, I'm starting to think the Phillies can go deep into the playoffs. Especially with the Cubs -- the NL's 800-pound gorilla all season long -- going off the rails so early.

The highlight of the night, to me, was not Shane Victorino's grand slam off the previously unhittable CC Sabathia, it was two at-bats earlier when Myers drew a walk in a nine-pitch at-bat. Myers, an admitted "terrible hitter," flailed at the first two pitches and missed 'em both by a country mile, then took a ball, then fouled off the next pitch, which prompted a sort of jocular cheer from the crowd -- "hey, at least you made contact!"

But then a funny thing happened.*

Myers takes another pitch outside the strike zone, then fouls off another pitch. Now the crowd, which is at least savvy enough to know the Phils would be well served to make Sabathia throw as many pitches as possible, begins cheering in earnest. Myers fouls off yet another pitch -- this one, I believe, a fastball -- and the roar is absolutely deafening. I was staring at the TV, thinking, "this is one of the greatest things I have ever seen." When Myers let ball four go by -- a 3-2 breaking ball to a pitcher, CC? -- the place fucking erupted.

And of course, it turned out to be a lot more than a minor victory of principle -- increasing the pitch count, turning the lineup over, etc.: Sabathia then walked Jimmy Rollins (not easy to do either) and coughed up the grand slam to Victorino.**

If you don't think Philly is much of a baseball town, I really hope you got to see that Myers at-bat.

One other thing: Vampire Weekend during a baseball telecast?!? Wow.

I lied; there's something else: The goddam Cubs just made another error.

*I know this is a Plaschke Paragraph, but I wanted to change tenses beginning with the next sentence and thought it should be separated from this one.

**Typewriter-slingin' cavemen like Jon Heyman will continue to take cheap shots at Charlie Manuel whenever possible, but Charlie switched two guys in the batting order for Game 2 -- Victorino and Jayson Werth -- and they combined to go 5 for 8, plus a walk. Heyman's rationale for his frequent anti-Charlie barbs, by the way: "Ehh, I'm just not impressed by him." I actually heard him say this in a radio interview.

Ah, fuck it -- one more thing: While I was editing this post, Emanuelito hit another moon shot. 6-0 Dodgers. Cubs = BURNT TOOOAST!!!

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